Deveri Gifford and Jason Yates are former Toronto residents (yay new Detroiters!) getting ready to open a breakfast and lunch place in Corktown called Brooklyn Street Local. Naturally, this has meant doing a lot of craigslist shopping. The got a church pew and most of the chairs for the restaurant from the online classified system, but the best thing was the piece of a barn that may at some point end up on an outdoor patio. Deveri explains that the CL post she found said something like, "my barn blew down. Come take the wood." So they did. These two business owners managed to scoop their building, originally listed for $199,000, for $180,000, a price which included all of the kitchen equipment (score!)
The couple explain that after deciding to move to Detroit to open a restaurant, they began working with real estate agent Ryan Cooley to buy a spot for it. When he discovered the owners of the Brooklyn Street Grill (which had been vacant for a few years at the time) had decided to sell, he called them up. The building was constructed as a restaurant in 1968 which at the time was called Left Field Deli but at different points throughout history has been occupied by other structures. Deveri has records indicating there was a single-family home that was removed from the site in the 1950s, and that previously the site had a store and a multi-family residence above a store. At various points it's been home to a grocery, a meat store, a record store, a school supplies store, a confectionary, a shoemaker, a radio shop and medicine shop.
The place came with a "diner-y" feel that the couple liked for the breakfast/lunch idea. Originally they had in mind something that might serve dinner, but felt there was more need for breakfast places in the neighborhood. They plan to be open in a few more weeks.
· Brooklyn Street Local [BSL blog]
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